Ireland’s brain drain at record level - one Irish person leaves home every five minutes

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The number of people leaving Ireland has now soared to 87,100 over the past year, according to official figures released on Thursday.

The latest research shows that one person is now leaving the country roughly every five minutes, given a daily average of 238, or one person every 303 seconds.

In the 12 months leading up to April, almost 35,000 of those who left Ireland were under the age of 25, according to the Central Statistics Office.

The US attracted some 8,600 Irish emigrants, 19,000 people emigrated to the UK, 24,000 moved to EU countries and the rest of the world attracted 35,600 people.

With emigration at a record high, Youth Work Ireland has warned that the demographic position of the country is approaching crisis level.

Michael McLoughlin of Youth Work Ireland said that Ireland’s brain drain is threatening the country’s smart economy.

"There must be a dedicated jobs strategy for young people if we are to avoid the effects of the massive emigration of the 1980s which so decimated communities," he told the Irish Independent.

"The spectre of emigration is a major social tragedy and seems to be accepted as almost an Irish solution to an Irish problem, this must be challenged."

Some key findings include:
-The number of Irish women emigrating rose from 17,500 to 20,600.
-The number of Irish men leaving increased from 24,500 to 26,000.
-The number of Irish citizens returning to live in the State rose for the third year in a row to 20,600.
-Some 52,700 immigrants came to Ireland in the same twelve month period.
-The number of births was 74,000 while the number of deaths
was 29,200.
-The overall population grew by 10,500 to 4.59 million.
-The male population fell by 900, for the first time since 1990.